Senior Manager, Data Science - AI & Data Science Center of Excellence

Requisition ID # 169174

Job Category: Accounting / Finance

Job Level: Senior Manager

Business Unit: Information Technology

Work Type: Hybrid

Job Location: Oakland

Department Overview

The Enterprise Data Science & Artificial Intelligence (EDS&AI) organization is both an AI “Delivery” team and a “Center of Excellence” team that supports other practitioners in an enterprise-wide Hub & Spoke analytics adoption model.

As a Delivery team, this Department uses industry leading data science and Generative AI (GenAI) to drive PG&E’s AI transformation enabling customer affordability, system reliability, and public safety. The Department works cross-functionally across the company to enable data driven decisions applying machine learning (ML), GenAI and agentic AI. Deployed to some of PG&E’s highest priority areas, the Department does not specialize in one traditional utility domain, such as asset management or program administration, but instead specializes in extracting useful insights from disparate data sets and facilitating actions informed by these insights.

As a Center of Excellence team, this Department listens to the needs of data science and AI practitioners across the company, along with emerging industry practices, and builds standards, processes, tools, knowledge and best practices that meet the current and future needs of the enterprise. This team works on a wide variety of difficult problems, offering great variety in the work, and constant opportunity to explore and learn.

Current and past engagements include:

- Building AI-augmented workflows leveraging LLM-based insights to remediate gas service record inaccuracies.

- Creating wildfire risk models that are used by regulators and the utility to prioritize asset management.

- Developing computer vision models that improve, accelerate, and automate asset inspections processes.

- Predicting electric distribution equipment failure before it occurs, allowing for proactive maintenance.

- Forming the analytical framework behind PG&E’s Transmission Public Safety Power Shutoff

- Identifying and investigating anomalous customer natural gas usage, to resolve dangerous customer side leaks.

Position Summary And Job Responsibilities Specific To The Role

We are seeking an experienced Senior Manager, Data Science to lead the AI & Data Science Center of Excellence for the company.

Leadership

- Grow the skills and careers of current team members while hiring to fill open positions

- Apply strong experience in data science and AI to mentor team members in their work

AI Governance

- Become certified in AI Governance

- Own strategic direction and guidance for responsible AI across the enterprise

- Ensure day-to-day AI governance execution

- Build toward process automation

- Evaluate and select vendor solutions as required

- Keeping abreast of existing AI and other emerging technologies regulations at the State and National level to pivot internal compliance

Consulting/Advisory

- Build a reputation of first-class consulting and advisory work in the COE

- Create a portfolio of offerings accessible by the enterprise

- Ensure efforts are tracked and strategically aligned with company objectives

- Maintain and improve best practice guidance documents

- Support data science, AI, and analytics Spokes across the company by disseminating and supporting the implementation of best practices for ML & AI development, in aspects such as code engineering and best practices in coding, modeling, product scalability, and the like

MLOps and LLMOps

- Lead cross functional efforts to implement responsible AI/ML systems across the enterprise

- Ensure execution is well-managed

- Evaluate and select vendor solutions as required

AI-Ready Workforce

- Own the Data Science Job Family at PG&E

- Revamp the Data Science Job Family career bands

- Review and approve/deny requests for entry into the Data Science Job Family

- Act as advisor to the People’s Organization (HRBP & Compensation) in the analysis of data science competencies, continuously monitoring the evolution of the industry and advising skill fitness to current data science work planned enterprise-wide

- Ensure healthy and well-functioning Communities of Practice

- Champion events such as internal conferences and symposiums

AI Leadership

- Assist the Director of Data Science & AI with enterprise AI Strategy

- Assist the Director of Data Science & AI in establishing EDS&AI as the leader in AI at PG&E

- Assist the Director of Data Science & AI in building relationships with other utilities and partners

- Speak internally and externally on AI; Provide thought leadership

- Build relationships across the company

In this position, you will play a vital role developing policies, standards, and processes that internal data science teams as well as contracted vendors will comply to for the effective design and development of data science and AI algorithms. Additionally, and in partnership with the People’s Organization (HRBP & Compensation), this role will also be key in the evaluation of enterprise data science skills and knowledge to help build trust of those competencies for internal decision-making processes as the industry evolves. You will have an unparallel opportunity to lead frameworks and guidelines for governance as well as operational and product excellence (i.e. AI product lifecycle evaluation, along with scalability, validity, and other performance measures) and provide thought leadership in emerging technologies that will influence delivery of solutions across the company. Because of that, this role is perfectly suited to someone who has large experience leading data science AI/ML and GenAI modeling work and would like now to make a contribution to the data science community as a technical expert and thought leader, managing a small team of data scientists who drive best practices in decision making excellence in the company, rather than delivering solutions themselves directly.

Position Details & Standard Work Descriptives

This position is hybrid, working from your remote office and the Oakland General Office (OGO) based on business needs or company requirements.

PG&E is providing the full salary/pay range for this position. The actual amount paid to an individual will be based on multiple factors, including, but not limited to, internal equity, specific skills, education, licenses or certifications, experience, market value, and geographic location.

The range to reasonably expect will be around the minimum and the midpoint $170,000 - $230,000. The final decision will be made on a case-by-case basis related to the factors above.

This job is also eligible to participate in PG&E’s discretionary incentive compensation programs.

Bay Area Min: $ 170,000

Bay Area Mid: $ 230,000

Bay Area Max: $ 290,000

Job Responsibilities (generic to the role, from the DS Job Family Catalog)

- Develops and builds high performing teams by setting goals, developing, and managing work resources, and ensuring the team has adequate tools, training, and technology to successfully deliver outcomes.

- Works with enterprise leaders to identify and solve complex business problems requiring the implementation of data science, machine learning and artificial intelligence.

- Ensures standards and processes are implemented to improve quality and timeliness of machine learning/artificial intelligence/optimization models.

- Develops and implements frameworks to validate models, methodologies, as well as communicate results.

- Acts as peer reviewer for complex code scripts and model development for broad scope projects. Reviews and approves the maturity for release of technical features in data science products.

- Conducts risk-evaluation studies on machine learning/artificial intelligence/optimization model impact of business outcomes. Assesses risk and maturity assessment of data science standards and tools.

- Participates in the community of practitioners that co-creates the development of data science, artificial intelligence, mathematical modeling and simulation, and similar emerging technologies to continuously assess their impact on business strategies

- Develops budget (expense, capital, and expenditures) and monitor, forecast and report on budget performance.

Qualifications

Minimum:

- Bachelor's degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Applied Science, Data Science, Engineering, Physics, Economics, or equivalent field

- 4 years of leadership experience in data science

- 2 years hands-on experience in data science (or no experience, if possess Advanced Degree, as described above)

Desired:

- 5 years Utility industry experience

- Advanced degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Applied Science, Data Science, Engineering, Physics, Economics, or equivalent field

Knowledge, Skills, Abilities and (Technical) Competencies:

- Demonstrated track record and understanding of data science and machine learning algorithms (supervised, unsupervised), ML domains (computer vision, NLP, etc.), and GenAI/agentic AI.

- Demonstrated track record in the following:

- Statistics: statistical modeling, experimental design, sampling, clustering, data reduction, confidence intervals, testing, modeling, predictive modeling and other related techniques;

- Artificial Intelligence: machine learning, LLMs, neural networks, predictive analytics, as they collect, analyze and extract value out of data; simulation;

- Software Engineering: programming languages, big data wrangling packages, cloud services, APIs, and related tools.

- Seeing ahead to future possibilities and translating them into breakthrough strategies.

- Ability to clearly and concisely communicate and present complex analysis to both quantitative and non- quantitative audiences.

- Competency in planning and prioritizing work to meet commitments aligned with organizational goals.

- Domain expertise: familiarity with one or more line of business (electric, customer, generation, procurement, gas, risk, etc.) and ability to identify areas where data science can improve processes and inform decision making (this may also include familiarity with the datasets/databases that support these lines of business)